Charles Scoville - Why Traffic Monsoon Isn't a Ponzi

Charles Scoville is again telling us Traffic Monsoon isn't a Ponzi. He uses example after example to explain his reasons why. But in 2015, he contradicted everything he says here:

July 31st 2017:
Update on what's happening now in the case can be found at the end of this post below.
So the Howey Test is the legal instrument to measure whether something is an investment or not.

The Howey Test, let's go through the bullet points.
1. Is there an investment of money?
- Reviewing the website, it clearly and repeatedly makes sure the potential customer is fully aware that the offer is for ad service, and not any investment. There are no refunds. Therefore a purchase of ad service is a purchase of service, and not an investment.

- The definition of an investment is placing your money into someone else's management control, but the money still belongs to you. As specified on TM, a purchase of ad service is not an investment nor a deposit. Money spent on ad service no longer still belongs to the customer. After payment of service and being credited what was paid for, the money spent rightfully belongs to the company.'

Charles 2015:

'When our members purchase a service from TrafficMonsoon, the revenues from that purchase are held by the company. Then, you can qualify to receive share of the profits! Naturally there is cost associated with providing services. Each service provided generates a profit margin. We share those profits with you!'

2. Does TM promise returns using a common enterprise (investment project)?
- Reviewing the website, you'll find there is no promise for any returns whatsoever.
- When you look over the website, there is no description for placing money into TM and that TM will use your money in a way aimed at gaining returns through some investment project.
- There is no pitch to invest, no investment project mentioned, and no returns offered.

Charles 2015:

'When our members purchase a service from TrafficMonsoon, the revenues from that purchase are held by the company. Then, you can qualify to receive share of the profits! Naturally there is cost associated with providing services. Each service provided generates a profit margin. We share those profits with you!'

3. Is the money invested placed (or promised to be) into any common enterprise (investment project).
- There is no investment project/common enterprise, nor was there said to be. There was not anything that said that money from customers would be used in any investment project, and the returns from the investment project were owed to the customer.

Charles 2015:

'When our members purchase a service from TrafficMonsoon, the revenues from that purchase are held by the company. Then, you can qualify to receive share of the profits! Naturally there is cost associated with providing services. Each service provided generates a profit margin. We share those profits with you!'

4. Are returns on investment from the managerial or entrepreneurial efforts of others?
- There are no returns on investment
- Any money received comes due to an individuals own effort. Must surf to receive any potential reward for surfing.
- Reward given for surfing does not carry the same legal definition as a return on any investment.

Charles 2015:

'When our members purchase a service from TrafficMonsoon, the revenues from that purchase are held by the company. Then, you can qualify to receive share of the profits! Naturally there is cost associated with providing services. Each service provided generates a profit margin. We share those profits with you!'

Can it be more clear? No security (meaning investment) truly exists within TM. The sec really have no jurisdiction, and this case shouldn't have ever happened.

As you can see by legal definition, the SEC are wrong, and the case should resolve in our favor. Published February 19, 2014 and quoted elsewhere too, the SEC enforcement director Andrew
Ceresney told The Washington Post, "If you’re not losing cases, you’re not being aggressive enough."

The SEC are overreaching, and are simply being aggressive bullies.. and sadly, the impact of their witch-hunt (added on top of the impact of the PayPal limitation) has hurt so many people all around the world, and they are only doing it for career advancements, recognition, etc-

https://www.wilmerhale.com/…/SEC-fight-valentine-rabner-cor…'

As it says in this article, "Mr. Ceresney’s comment came as no surprise to us. Over our combined 23 years representing clients in SEC matters, willingness to push the envelope in close cases—to “regulate by enforcement”—has been a hallmark of the agency’s enforcement division."

*I highly recommend reading this article to understand more about the SEC and their history of misapplying the law in their accusations.*

Keep in mind, the notice of appeal on the preliminary injunction was filed 14 April 2017, and I've been advised by attorneys this appeals process can take about a year.. sometimes more, and sometimes less, so there will be little or no change in the case until then.

If for whatever reason we do not prevail on the appeal, then the case will continue forward through depositions, discovery, and other steps which can take years before a trial with a jury to determine whether TM is liable for what the SEC allege. I'm hopeful through this appeal we can display based upon the legal definitions why this case shouldn't have even been brought against TM.'

Tony and Lynne Booth My Advertising Pays - Small Claims Case Launched

A Small Claims case against Tony and Lynne Booth from My Advertising Pays was filed on
July 27th 2017. 
The Claimants are seeking to recover in excess of £4000.
The County Court papers have been received by the Claimant and the defendants have until August 17th 2017 to respond.

Please watch this space for future updates.

Tony Booth, Lynne Booth and Michael Deese - My Advertising Pays and Recodeit

Tony and Lynne Booth met Mike Deese in 2012. 
Tony used to have an online blog (now unavailable) in which he tells the full story of how they met:

'My wife and I first heard of Mike Deese back in 2012 when we started to look into the online world of advertising for our window installation company. We fully expected to find many online companies and network marketers ready to SCAM us and take our money.
Mike was at this time an expert internet marketer making a living online. He was an excellent unbiased network blogger offering genuine good advice of how to get the most from this new online world where you are more likely to find SCAMS first.
He never asked us as his followers to join a program he was involved in but was more than helpful in offering sound advice without charge. We soon began to trust him and his views and indeed joined a couple of programs he recommended but not under him at this timenasnwe wanted to see if this guy was for real.
Sure enough we found the advice to be good and started to make our first money online. Mike still althrough not earning any commissions from our efforts would still continue to offer his helpful advice and gain more of our trust.
We built on online relationship with him over the coming year until early 2013 when Mike called Lynne and announced that he would no longer be offering any more advice on internet programs no matter how good they looked and even if they passed his strict acid test.
He felt that the industry was failing him too much as so many companies were falling away and he did not want to be the person advising anyone to join any of these unstable opportunities. Mike did not want to put his name to a company and someone puts there last $50 only to find it gone three months later.
Lynne asked him what he would do instead his reply " I cannot and will not recommend another online company unless it is my own.  The only way I can trust and recommend another online company is to build my own."
He then disappeared from the market place for three months to do exactly this in March 2013.
June 2013 Mike Deese put out a call to action for his followers of which Lynne was one of the respondents. As a consequence of these email communications we arranged a meeting with him via Skype. This four hour meeting was to prove an incredible change of direction for Lynne and myself as he unfolded his idea of My Advertising Pays. We developed our business relationship and soon after fantastic friendship with him.
This is the sole reason My Advertising Pays was born, out of Mike's frustration of all the failed mismanaged and out and out SCAM companies.'

By Tonys own admission, both he and Lynne developed My Advertising Pays together with Mike. Mike even recognises their contributions in a video from the One Year Anniversary Event in London on December 13th 2014:

 

My Advertising Pays was launched in Dec 2013.

Tony's Official company title was 'My Advertising Pays Communications Executive'.

Lynnes Official Title at My Advertising Pays is Executive Secretary

This tweet from Tonys Twitter feed states an ROI of 120%

Tony and Lynne gave an interview in 2015 about the roles they have at 

 My Advertising Pays  

RECODEIT

On 9th September 2015, Michael Deese registered a company in England called RECODEIT LTD.

On 27th October 2015, he appointed Tony and Lynne Booth
as Directors and terminated his own Directorship.  

This video was shot on 26th August 2017

As of July 23rd 2017, 'My Advertising Pays' is still registered at Companies House as an Active company.

As of July 23rd 2017, 'RECODEIT' is still registered at Companies House as an Active company.

Neobux - Paypal Close Account

Neobux are the latest 'business'  to have their Account terminated by Paypal. 

July 7th 2017

2017/07/07 at 14:33
Admin edited message on 2017/07/09 at 15:02

PayPal contacted us today to notify us they would be terminating our account.
I won't sugarcoat it, this news came as a total, shocking surprise.

To add insult to injury, they clarified there was nothing wrong on our end, but since they faced huge problems due to the practices of another known website, which theoretically belonged in the PTC vertical -even though they operated in a completely different way than our business model-, they were now forced to cancel every account belonging to a PTC website, regardless if there is a direct violation of their User Acceptance Policy or not.

No matter how unfair this might be, we have to remain pragmatic and ensure that the principles that made NeoBux what it is today remain unaffected.

To that end, we will adapt in order to make this transition as smooth as possible for our members. First of all, no user will lose a single penny and there will be NO "necessary" deductions of any kind. That is guaranteed.

In addition, any limitations regarding transactions through PayPal, as per our Terms of Service point 5.1, will stop in 4 weeks from now to ensure that no frustrations or long-term limitations are imposed on users who made purchases through PayPal.
Unfortunately, this is a necessary procedure until we can deal with the necessary bureaucracy in order to withdraw money from our terminated PayPal account. This simply means that before 4 weeks from now (we believe around the end of the month but don't quote me on that) every user that's bound by point 5.1 to PayPal purchases will be free to chose another payment processor. Unfortunately we cannot legally remove that restriction until then so please bear with us on that. As soon as we have the legal ok we'll remove it. This obviously won't affect those not bound to PayPal purchases.

All the PayPal purchases buttons have been already removed. The cashout button will redirect to this thread so that everyone sees it.

All the PayPal references from our Terms of Service, FAQ, etc, will be gradually removed as well.

The only positive note under the current conditions is that users have been shifting away from PayPal and started using other payment processors in the past months, which makes the situation not as difficult as it would have been in the past.

Finally, this setback will not compromise or affect the pillars upon which NeoBux has been built: Reliability, trust, innovation and transparency.
We will never become like the ones responsible for this outcome.

Unfortunately we have to pay for the mistakes of others but at least we'll make things right in the end because we're all a family and that's how it will always be.

Thank you.

____________________________

Just to update on the situation:
PayPal finally sent us the official email which states their official reply on the account's closure:


This image has been resized. Click this bar to view the image in full size.




It doesn't say anything new: That the account is limited, we cannot send payment to our users and that it will be permanently closed in less than a week.
It does give us all we need to take the legal route against them since they're breaching their own agreements.

Just another screenshot taken from our PP account basically with the same info:



                                                   ********************************

Interesting that Paypal use the phrase 'risk posed' which is the same reason they gave for the asset freeze at Traffic Monsoon.

Neobux also seem to have abandoned their Facebook page, the last post was 9th April  

2017

...and their Twitter Feed last posted on March 24th 2017:

Watch this space...

My Paying Ads - Four Stages to Losing Your Money

*updated 16th July 2017

In May 2017,  Uday at My Paying Ads said he will refund everybodies seed money.

Sounds good, but has he done it yet?
This was his original post from May 18th:

MPA/MPCA Stages Going Forward as of 18th May 2017

Stage 1:
Refund all purchases made from payment processor from May 10th to May 15th 2017
back to members processors
Cancel all withdrawals up to and including 9th May 2017
Withdrawal amounts returned to member earning balances
Time frame: Proceeding now

Stage 2:
Open MPA and MPCA Traffic Exchange Sites
Time frame: Within 7 days

Stage 3:
Open the new product platforms, CC,
Local Business Directory Listing
Time frame: Within 14 days(CC)
to 8 weeks(Local Business Directory Listing)

Stage 4:
Return 'Seed Money' – Total Processor Purchases minus Total Withdrawals
Time frame: Begin within 3 months,
based on profit generated from the new products and partner programs
Members DO NOT to send in support tickets for Seed Money until further notice'

Fast forward today and has Uday refunded anybody? 
He says he's refunded half of all his members so far, but judging from the comments by his 4500 odd Facebook members, not one of them seems to have received anything.

The Official My Paying Ads Facebook page carries this notice:

10th July 2017
READ THE WHOLE POST !!!!!!!!!!!
For all that keep asking: When do we start up Why no new update or When will Uday start paying out seed money .
1) : Traffic exchange is nearly complete and just testing to follow through then ready to launch. No need for a update until They are ready !
2) No need for a update when Uday has no news . All info is in the Update in the TOP of the Facebook group or on the website Admin message .
3) Return SEED Money : All purchases made before the 10th of may 2017 . NO NEED TO RAISE a TICKET .We are committed to generate the new revenue to refund the seed money balances to the members who have not withdrawn more than their seed money balance through our upcoming new advertising products and new partner programs. There is no fixed time frame for this as it depends on when we can generate the necessary targeted revenue to refund to the seed money balance to all eligible members.
4) Refunds : All purchases made from the 10th until the 15th of may 2017 Raise a ticket for a refund '.Some of the comments in response:

'Where's the proof that half has been paid back? Just because you said it, doesn't make it so.'

'No one receive seed money. .... in my group'.

'I totally agree with what the people are saying, how do we know if half of the people really got their seed money back? '

'How long have i been surfing your site without any interest and i did not get seed money.'

'Lies lies lies. Got nothing'

Despite Udays promise to refund this 'seed money' it's now been confirmed that any money returned will just come from the NEW Ponzi that Uday is creating. The three month timeframe that gave Uday some wriggle room is always up, so lets see how he gets out of this one. I'll keep you posted...


July 16th 2017

Another update:

Update from #MPA and #MPCA Management (15th July 2017)

Dear All,

We hope you are all doing good. We have some significant progress in the development of scripts needed for our upcoming partner programs and hence we like to update you the progress at this junction.

[1] For one of the Advertising platforms working with bitcoin, the programming is near to completion. Currently, the testing of the features is going on and we will be able to launch it within one week time from now or before. Also, we will share the details of the program in 2-3 days time and will open the pre-registrations.

[2] As mentioned earlier, the bigger expectation for the revenue generation is from Business Directory and programmers have finished more than 80% of the basic coding needed. We are looking at getting the script ready for testing in 2-3 weeks time. For this also we will start sharing the details this week so that the interested affiliates can be recruited and started giving some training.

This script is entirely new as the off shelf scripts does not meet our needs. Hence, the programmers have been exclusively working on this script to make sure that they can deliver on what we need. We are satisfied with the progress so-far and it is going to be ready on-time.

[3] Turning MPA and MPCA into normal traffic exchanges was put on hold because the programmers wanted to work on the above two projects exclusively to make sure that they can develop the features that we have asked for. So, this item will be worked on sometime now.

[4] As updated earlier, Mr Shaf Memon will be leading the CC program and it is scheduled to be launched after the bitcoin based advertising platform. The plan and the launch details will be shared in the due course of time.

[5] Meanwhile, we like to open a new Facebook group only for the members who are waiting for the seed money balance so that any exclusive announcements to be made will be communicated through the same. There may be some details and announcements which we only want to communicate with the members who are waiting for seed money balance. Also, we will share the details of the revenue generated on daily basis through pinned post in this group. This is open to members who are waiting for seed money balance only and it is mandatory for all those members to join this group to get updates. If you do not have a Facebook account, you may want to open one temporary profile for this purpose and join the group. We will share the Facebook group link soon. Please gather the following information which is needed before joining this group:

[A] Member id number of MPA/MPCA:
[B] Total Payment Processor Purchase amount:
[C] Total Withdrawals:
[D] Seed Money balance: [B]-[C]

Please take help from your friends to open a FB profile, if needed.

The main MPA and MPCA Facebook group will continue to function as normal.

[6] Just a note on the delay for updates. I was severely traumatized by the developments at MPA/MPCA, negative comments, scammer accusations, threats and blackmails, rigorous push for seed money returns while we do not have any funds etc and hence could not attend to my daily activities. I have been building up the strength needed to move forward. Hence, there was a delay in the updates.

We have been functioning with utmost honesty since March 2015 and there have been no wrong doings. The program has stalled because of not enough sales and hence we arrived to the current situations. Unfortunately, some members have been interpreting it wrongly.

[7] We will do all necessary things to generate the revenue and return the seed money balance. There will be no doubts about it. But, it will take time. Please only remember one thing, the seed money may not come when you need but it will come for your use at an appropriate time after the funds will be generated.

Please kindly do not worry and panic about the bitcoin fluctuations. We will try to refund the seed money balance such that you will get the highest value of the btc vs USD conversion. We will generate the revenue until that point where you will get maximum benefit. We will provide more details in the due course of time.

As we do not have funds for any refunds now (the refunds will follow as we generate the new revenue), we may not be able to reply for the current requests that are coming in. We will continue to send the seed money balance as we generate the new revenue and the stats of the seed money balance returns will be given in the pinned post of the new FB group that is going to be opened soon.

More to follow in the next updates. Thanks for all your kind support and good wishes.

Regards,
Uday N

#MPA and #MPCA Admin

                                           ***************************

To Recap:

Uday says he has no money to pay refunds, the new money will come from his NEW ponzi that presumably he wants old affiliates to join?

He also wants to open a NEW Facebook page where members can pretend to be someone else so they can get updates that people who AREN'T owed money, can't see.

How to join this special group? Put your membership number and all the details of the money owed, onto a PUBLIC Facebook page!

Why hasn't Uday got his affiliates financial records safely stored? Doesn't he own a computer? And why can't he repay the money as promised?  At least that question is easy to answer -  the lifespan of this ponzi is over, so he needs to start a NEW one. And what's the best way to start up a NEW Ponzi? Simple, ensure that lots of NEW members join to inject lots more cash so he can pay all the NEW members, and the old.

The  PONZI wash cycle goes around again, CASH in, RINSE out, SPIN BS, REPEAT...